Fulcrum builds network software development alliance

A lot of the hottest Ethernet news these days seems to be driven by the component vendors, the makers of the silicon that goes into the switches we buy. This week at Interop Las Vegas 2008, Fulcrum Microsystems gathered several vendors and announced an alliance to develop software for routing switches.

Fulcrum is making its own software available to the other members of the alliance to use on their own hardware platforms, giving them the rights to develop their own features for it as well. Features could include anything from security to QoS controls.

Fulcrum describes its ControlPoint 10G Ethernet Switch Management Software Suite as "a complete IP routing software solution for enterprise, data center, and telecom fabric and access platforms."

Well, it can't be all that "complete," can it? Otherwise there would be nothing for the alliance members to add. But I pick nits.

Members of the ControlPoint Developer Alliance can also use each other's software developed for the platform. In other words, there's a kind of sharing among the members of the alliance, potentially reducing duplication.

Founding members include Continuous Computing, Green Hills Software, Liquid Computing, Nimbus Data Systems, Open Grid Computing, Panasas, Quadrics, SMC Networks and XORP.

These companies get ControlPoint, a 24-port 10G Ethernet switch reference design and a software development kit for creating new features. Fulcrum says members get access to the Layer 2 and Layer 3 stacks of ControlPoint for both IPv4 and IPv6, and technical support services for debugging and sharing development tips are also available.

Jeff Caruso is site editor at Network World.